consultation

The prof. I’m assisting has finally (probably after seeing the results of the mid-term) acknowledged that his class is not succeeding. Yesterday only 20 (out of about 30) students showed up, and after the break only 12 returned to class. He emailed me today to tell me that he has requested a consultation from the education department.

There are a lot of things missing from the class, but I’d say that one of the main things is facilitation of interest. He assumes that the people are already interested in the class; I know that it’s a requirement that they be there (as are all classes that are towards one’s coursework). The trick is to create interest in the class where there initially was none. Instead the opposite is happening – students are becoming apathetic.

I wonder how he has been successful with this teaching style in the past? This isn’t his first time teaching…is our university culture so different that it’s not working here? Or has he been treating all of his classes this way and just not listening to the feedback of the students/TAs (though I think I may be the first).